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Man’s strange note alarms bank employees

By Genevieve Reilly| on April 6, 2017

FAIRFIELD — A California man’s strange note alarmed employes at a local bank Wednesday morning, but he was apparently just looking for free coffee and candy.

Shortly after 10 a.m., an employee at the Darien Rowayton Bank, 3695 Post Road, called police after a man, later identified as Chad Busto, had come into the bank and was acting strangely. The man was “scruffy,” wearing an orange hat and baggy pants, and carrying a backpack that had a yellow pole sticking out of it, according to the police report.

He asked if they could help him out with some coffee, and tellers pointed him toward a table in the lobby with a coffee machine. He stood in the bank, looking over the interior, and then in front of the teller counter “for an extended period of time and appeared to either be looking at the security cameras in place or watching the television that is mounted on the wall behind the teller’s counter,” police said.

Busto then made himself a cup of coffee and wrote something down on a withdrawal slip. After being confronted by an employee, Busto was asked to leave. He did, but first left the note. It read, “This Really is the real two-hundred million dollars; this is fake.”

While checking the area, police learned a similar incident had happened at a Westport bank around 9:50 a.m. Busto was found walking east on the Post Road near Beaumont Street, and he told police he was traveling across country and was walking to Boston, after arriving in New York City several days ago.

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He said he stopped at banks because they usually had free coffee and candy. Busto, 37, was also questioned by Westport police and warned not to return to the Darien Rowayton Bank. He was given a ride to the Bridgeport line by police.